Peter, Paul and Mary

AP Photo/PBS/WNET

The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll called Peter, Paul and Mary "the most popular acoustic folk music group of the 1960's." During that decade they produced 11 albums, 5 of which became million sellers. And they scored 12 hit singles, including the classic children's song, "Puff, the Magic Dragon" and "Leaving on a Jet Plane," a ballad written by John Denver. The group brought folk music to a new prominence in the post-McCarthy era, putting songs about politics and morality on the radio amid the syrupy boy-girl love songs that dominated when they began playing together in the early 1960s.

Peter Yarrow, Noel Paul Stookey and Mary Travers made their debut in 1961 at the Bitter End in Greenwich Village. On the strength of this performance, they were signed to a recording contract with Warner Brothers. Released in May 1962, their first eponymously titled album included their rendition of Pete Seeger's song, "If I Had a Hammer," a hit that was the first record to bring protest music to a mainstream audience. Eighteen months later their version of "Blowin' in the Wind" became a hit, and the first commercially successful recording of a song written by Bob Dylan.

As their fame grew, Peter, Paul and Mary mixed music with political and social activism. In 1963 the trio marched with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Ala., and Washington, D.C. The three participated in countless demonstrations against the war in Vietnam. And they sang at the 1969 March on Washington, which Mr. Yarrow helped to organize.

Exhausted by nearly 10 years of nonstop touring and recording, Mr. Yarrow, Mr. Stookey and Ms. Travers disbanded in 1970. But it proved to be only an intermission. They reunited on a part-time basis in 1978, and continued to perform together for decades. They have five Grammy Awards and a handful of gold and platinum albums.

Only the most tuned-out members of the baby boom generation can claim never to have heard of Mary Travers. After all, she's part of Peter, Paul and Mary, a trio that the Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll calls "the most popular acoustic folk music group of the 1960's."

One of the remarkable things about Peter, Paul and Mary, who are celebrating their 25th anniversary in show business, is how little their music has changed over the years. The trio has made no concessions to contemporary pop technology. As in the 1960's, they continue to make spare acoustic folk-pop, accompanying themselves on two guitars augmented only by a light acoustic bass.

Twenty-five years after Mary Travers first sang with Peter Yarrow and Paul Stookey, the trio has been marking its anniversary with concerts for causes - standard operating procedure for the pop-folk singers who have played more than 300 benefits for causes and candidates in the past three years alone.

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November 11, 2009, Wednesday

Mary Travers, whose ringing, earnest vocals with the folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary made songs like ''Blowin' in the Wind,'' ''If I Had a Hammer'' and ''Where Have All the Flowers Gone?'' enduring anthems of the 1960s protest movement, died on...

September 18, 2009, Friday

Now That's What We Call a Fan PETER, PAUL and MARY had a party at Peter's -- that is to say PETER YARROW's -- apartment the other day. It's a duplex, off Central Park West. There are some hippie vestiges; the high ceiling is peeling badly, the...

February 26, 2004, Thursday

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NEWS A Reprise Thirty years ago, the folk singers Peter, Paul and Mary performed in a Carnegie Hall benefit concert to support the United Farm Workers' effort to seek higher wages for California grape workers. On Thursday, the trio will celebrate...

Peter, Paul and Mary take over public television's "Great Performances" tonight for a show called "Lifelines," a celebration of folk music going back at least as far as their early days in Greenwich Village. For anyone who prowled the folk scene in...